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Sometimes loosely described as a laisser passer (in German, Passierschein), this was an official permit for a diplomat or any other individual to enter and travel ‘without let or hindrance’ through a specified state, usually one with which his or her country was at war. However, until international law began to give relatively uniform protection to diplomatic envoys in the country of their accreditation after the sixteenth century, it was customary for safe-conducts to be required by diplomats even in receiving – as well as transit – states, and securing them was a task for intrepid messengers. Of course, a number of developments have dramatically reduced the problems which traditionally led diplomats to seek safe-conducts, especially in transit states. Among these are air travel and the emergence of the customary rule (since codified in the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations 1961), that a diplomat admitted to a third country in the course of a journey to or from his or
her post, is entitled to personal inviolability and ‘such other immunities as may be required to ensure his transit or return’. As a result, safe-conducts fell into disuse in the twentieth century. See also right of transit; visa. |
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